The president again took to social media to attempt to undercut the Russia investigation this weekend. In the wake of the Friday release of a report from Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee outlining their pro-Trump conclusions drawn after about one year of investigation, the president took to social media to tout the news and claim it as evidence for the whole scandal being nothing more than a “witch hunt” in the first place.
Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was among the targets of his ranting and raving this Saturday; in an effort to distract even further from the core of the Russia scandal, the president and his allies have taken to claiming there to be faults in the nation’s justice system.
Former CIA Director John Brennan served alongside Clapper, and on Saturday, he fittingly took the president to task for his criticism and name-calling directed at the former DNI.
Getting straight to the point, the Obama admin official wrote on Twitter:
‘Mr. Trump: Your hypocrisy knows no bounds. Jim Clapper is a man of integrity, honesty, ethics, & morality. You are not. Jim Clapper served his country for over a half century, including in Vietnam. You did not. By your words & behavior, you diminish the Office of the Presidency.’
Brennan was responding to a tweet from the president that read:
‘“Clapper lied about (fraudulent) Dossier leaks to CNN”
@foxandfriends FoxNews He is a lying machine who now works for Fake News CNN.’
The allegation underlying the president’s anger is that Clapper leaked information about the infamous “Trump dossier” to CNN. That dossier collected allegations against the president covering everything from alleged cooperation with the Russians on the part of his team to alleged Russian sway over him maintained through possession of documentation of the president interacting with Russian prostitutes.
The dossier was compiled by Christopher Steele, who is himself a former British intelligence officer, and the opposition research underlying it was funded by opponents to the president including Democrats. Unsurprisingly, the president and his allies have bristled at the very existence of the allegations, although their anxiety doesn’t fit with how innocent they claim themselves to be.
One of the lines of defense from the president’s camp is that members of a non-existent “deep state conspiracy” are responsible for amplifying the impact of the allegations. Concurrently, the recently released report from House Republicans suggests that Clapper himself leaked information about the dossier to CNN, but the Democratic counter to that document provides his defense.
Clapper explained that while he did discuss the dossier with CNN’s Jake Tapper, at the time, the news organization already had possession of the document.
The president, however, seems persistently unwilling to acknowledge even the possibility that there’s not some kind of conspiracy against him.
Meanwhile, authorities’ inquiries into those close to him are continuing. His personal lawyer Michael Cohen is under criminal investigation and his former campaign manager Paul Manafort will soon face trial on an array of tax and bank fraud charges related to overseas work for Russia-aligned political interests.
Check out Twitter’s response to Brennan below.
Featured Image via Alex Wong/Getty Images
